The appellation named after the municipality with around 1,700 hectares of vineyards forms an island in the large Graves area in southern Bordeaux. It consists of the five communes of Bommes, Fargues-de-Langon, Preignac and Sauternes, as well as the right to its own appellation Barsac with 600 hectares. All Barsac wines may also use the name Sauternes or Sauternes-Barsac, but this does not apply vice versa. For centuries, mainly sweet white wines have been produced here from botrytised grapes. The later US President Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), who was bOTSCHAFTER in Paris from 1785 to 1789 and visited many French wine-growing regions, described Sauternes as the best white wine in the country after Champagne and Hermitage. His ranking was also used as one of the criteria for the 1855 Sauternes classification (see below).
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Markus J. Eser
Weinakademiker und Herausgeber „Der Weinkalender“